We are all suffering from zero barriers to entry. No one stops you from skipping right to messaging on a social media platform or two before you are ready. Social Media is flooded with an avalanche of poorly contrived content. If you are moving through my three steps to success, you can read that I have Facebook in second place after Google My Business Profile. Hopefully, you have begun the discipline of creating and publishing content in your Google Business Profile. As a result, you may now be able to see trends in what is connecting with searchers. This means you can predict what may interest your Facebook community. It is important to remember members of your Facebook community have opted in to hear from you 24/7 without your needing permission. However, with that gift of trust and opportunity comes great responsibility.  Be sure that any content you share is of value to your members. Facebook is a great place to share valuable content as a benefit of membership. Offer your community new or limited inventory updates, a thank you discount, or a secret sale there before you go public, proving that membership has benefits. Don’t bombard your community with BUY BUY BUY, or they will disappear.

Crafting content, replying to comments, and engaging with your thriving community on Facebook provides clues to the Facebook Algorithm about who might be interested in your brand, so when you move to run a Facebook Ad Manager, the “learning curve” to improve your results and reduce your spend is shorter.

In my 25 years as a storefront owner, I never thought running an ad in the local newspaper was odd. It was commonplace to do so, yet for some reason, many are slow to practice running an ad via Facebook Ads Manager as a trusted practice. With print falling out of favor, most storefronts simply do no advertising. I can share that the clients who run a small ongoing ad campaign receive stellar results for just cents on the dollar. Unlike print ads, within three days, the data tells us how effectively our ad campaign is driving traffic to our offer. Where else can you run an ad for 3-4 dollars a day and get attention for your offer at under 50 cents? Additionally, Facebook provides insights regarding who clicked the link. Data you can use to continue to learn who and why a person is a potentially relevant and warm audience for your brand.